The Unspeakable in Poetry: A Love Story

5.2 poet Julie L. Moore explains how her poem became the occasion of our first printing the word "vulva" - and it turns out to be for the best of reasons.

Back in July of 1975, when I was just ten, a nurse carted me into the operating room of West Jersey Hospital. My parents walked along at my gurney’s side, my dad, holding my hand. At the O.R. door, the gurney stopped, my parents kissed me, and I looked at them and said, “Don’t worry. God is going to take care of me.”

In May of 2009, a nurse rolled me into the operating room at Kettering Medical Center in southwest Ohio for my eighth surgery and the removal of my fourth organ. My faith, scarred as my abdomen by then, was no longer blind or simple but hard as a dog’s big rawhide bone. When it fell, it clattered as it hit the floor. It was also vulnerable, capable of being devoured in one sitting, if I let it, by the sharp teeth and strong jaws of pain. And it wasn’t the kind of faith you cuddled up with.

It’s fairly easy to talk about losing body parts. I’ve received phone calls from friends and emails from readers I don’t know who find themselves in my uncomfortable shoes:

I have an ovarian cyst. Didn’t you get an ovary removed because of this? I’m going crazy here. Can you help me?

I’m having all kinds of trouble after having had my gall bladder removed last year. I heard you had trouble, too . . .

And I answer them.

Some, too, have contacted me because they endure unimaginable pain, the kind of long and deep suffering I had no idea existed when I was just ten. The kind that digs into their bones, their backs, their bellies. And that, too, I have talked about.

But there is one area that, until now, I found to be unspeakable. I knew I wasn’t alone, that other women endured what I was experiencing. But write about it? That just seemed wrong. On many levels.

Level One: I’d embarrass my family and/or myself.

Level Two: I just shouldn’t talk about that. Some things should remain private.

Level Three: If my readers know that, they’ll focus only on that and not on my work. (Maybe that’s not a category of “wrong” but rather a category of “ego.” But still.)

So I wrote about enduring pain, about making sense of suffering. I was vivid in my descriptions and clear about the temptations intractable pain brings, like overdosing on medications from well-meaning doctors. When pain stabs, shoots, tears, claws, shocks, and yes, feels like “fifty pins embedded” in flesh, who can stand it?

Yet, I avoided describing all my medical conditions for a variety of reasons. One, I didn’t want readers getting distracted by terminology and two, the most important thing was never what went wrong in my body but how, and why, I endured it.

After I’d published poems about my experiences, however, there was still a voice, sounding an awful lot like Elizabeth Bishop, that kept saying, “Write it!”

And “Prayer Shawl” was born. “Confession,” a poem I’d written several years ago, was the only poem that came close to naming the body parts that hurt, the incredibly feminine nature of my pain. But that poem was cloaked in biblical narrative, the hemorrhaging woman whose labia throbbed.

How to say vagina in a poem. Or vulva. With the possessive pronoun my.

But there it is in “Prayer Shawl,” a poem wrapped in the story of others, dear friends, who have likewise suffered, felt the temptation to throw in the towel, experienced the unrelenting grief of permanent loss. Yet endure.

And my poem is wrapped in the story of my marriage, a husband who has also endured pain and anxiety and the threat of premature death. How terrifying to live through such experiences together in our early forties. This wasn’t the way our story was supposed to go.

And how agonizing to realize that the love we shared, and yes, the making of that love, could not heal me. That I experienced such tremendous pain off and on for six years stood to threaten the very fabric of our marriage. What’s a love story without good sex, after all?

Except that sex isn’t the only way spouses can express love. Except that love can transcend even suffering. Except that prayer to a God who hung himself on a cross, while nails, no less, simultaneously punctured his tender flesh, really has sustained me.

This is my story, pain and love on multiple levels, a story that, as I’ve lived it, has often struck me dumb.

Julie L. Moore's poem "Prayer Shawl" appears in issue 5.2 of Relief.

5.2 eBook Now Available

For the first time ever, we would like to present you with our eBook before the print copy is available. Creating a hard copy takes a lot of time and extra energy, so, while our team is still hard at work churning it out, we've been able to secure the eBook early! The eBook comes in PDF format, perfect for reading on your computer, smartphone, or tablet device. And did we mention it's only $4.99?! Get your copy now by clicking the button below, or you can pick it up on our Buy page along with the eBooks for our last six issues.

Announcing 5.2 Fiction Authors

[table id=2 /]

Announcing 5.2 Poets

[table id=1 /]

Announcing 5.2 Creative Nonfiction Authors

	Gayle L. Boss "Sitting with the Rabbit" Gayle Boss is a freelance writer in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where she and her husband also raise two sons.
	Grace Campbell "Aftershocks" Grace Campbell is from Grand Rapids, Michigan, but is also a student at Cedarville University in Ohio where she is studying Technical and Professional Communication. She enjoys running cross country and track at Cedarville as well as working at the Cedarville University Writing Center. After graduation Grace would like to be an editor and run marathons.
	Jean Hoefling "Remission" Jean Hoefling is the author of two books on Eastern Orthodox Christianity (Regina Orthodox Press), and several articles on the humorous side of living cross-culturally. She is co-owner of J&J Copywriters, works as a freelance copyeditor, and is currently writing a book on suffering. She lives with her husband, Tim, in Louisville, Colorado, and enjoys hiking and church stuff.
	Heidi Gabrielle Nobles "Watching Songs" Heidi Gabrielle Nobles earned her M.A. at Baylor University and her M.F.A. at the University of South Carolina. Her creative writing has appeared in Relief, Welter, and Aenonfire; she also writes for the National Association of Military Families and blogs for Abilene Christian University, where she currently teaches. She is looking for a publisher for her first book, Confiding History, about U.S. military children growing up around the world.
	Chely Roach "Drowning the Albatross” Chely Roach is a lifelong St. Louisan, along with her husband and their preschool-aged twin daughters. Together, they have owned and operated their own business since 1993, though the kids aren’t much help yet. Not long after enlisting into Baby Boot Camp, she rekindled her love of written words, all while acquiring honorary Masters Degrees in tandem nursing and sleep deprivation. On the rare occasion that she is conscious, coherent and captures a moment of peace, she loves to read grown-up books, cook all things delicious (while ignoring the dishes), and write stuff. This is Chely’s first print publication.
	Heather M. Surls "The Door of Hope" Heather recently returned to the States after living in Israel for two years. She now lives in Illinois, in an apartment complex housing refugees and immigrants from more than a dozen people groups. There she reads voraciously, takes frequently walks around the nearby pond, and strives to love God, her husband, and her neighbors.

Presenting the 5.2 Cover and Presales

The Relief staff is churning out the next issue as quickly as possible, so we've got some great announcements coming at you this week starting with the cover (right) and presales. The cover was created by artist Sandra Bowden, and we've got an interview with her below, but first...

Presales are now available!

As of right now, you can pre-order Relief Issue 5.2 for $11.47—25% less than retail. This offer is only available for the next few weeks we wrap up the production of the issue. Don't miss this opportunity to save a few bucks and receive 5.2 immediately after the journal has been printed. To pre-order, just click the Add to Cart button below.

An Interview with Sandra Bowden

Relief: Tell us a little about "Crossing" the painting featured on our cover for issue 5.2.

Sandra: The official description reads:

This small encaustic contrasts the vibrant textured red “X” or “cross” that strides across the face of the painting to the glow of the gilded surface.

I did it originally for my granddaughter’s eighteenth birthday. I wanted to create a cross that had dynamic movement, boldness, yet was subtle at the same time. The texture of the work demands attention, and the contrast of the red against the gold surface of the background adds dimension.

Relief: Much of your art has an obviously Christian bent to it. How would you describe the relationship between your faith and your artistic practice?

Sandra: The relationship between my faith and my art has always been intertwined. The works that I have created and the series of works that have emerged are a visual record of my intellectual and spiritual journey over the last 50 years. I follow the work, let it ask the questions, and then I search for the next piece as an answer to the questions and possibilities that the previous one has prompted, both artistically and spiritually.

Relief: What gets you excited about art and/or "Christian" art today?

Sandra: Here is something that i just wrote for Transpositions, a blog in England:

In 1980, I promised God that if it did not have to do with faith and art, then I would not do it. That decision has given me great freedom to be involved in Christians in the Visual Arts and the Museum of Biblical Art, along with continuing to be a practicing artist and a serious collector of religious art. All of these efforts are aimed at helping the church reclaim the arts. For over 20 years CIVA has offered an array of traveling exhibits of historical and contemporary art to churches, colleges, and seminaries, and as a result several hundred church related galleries have come into existence during that time. Mobia has mounted some of the most significant religious art exhibitions in the United States, receiving remarkable reviews. Our personal collection continues to grow and is loaned out to institutions as a way to engage people in the visual arts. Each of these efforts offers experiences and opportunities to expand understanding and appreciation of the arts. These are only a few of the many organizations, websites, blogs, symposiums and conferences that have sprung up to explore new ways of engaging the arts in the community of faith. There is a movement that is reviving the visual arts in the life of the church and it is very exciting.

You Lost Me - Millenials and the Church

Here is an interesting review of David Kinnaman's You Lost Me, featured in The Englewood Review of Books and written by Josh Wallace (a personal friend) about the reasons American youths are leaving the church in their 20s. Of particular interest to us at Relief, I think, are the categories of the Nomad and Exile - people, in the former case, who wander away from Christianity without really abandoning spirituality, or, in the latter, who do not feel at home within the church. I would like to think that Relief appeals to these folks as a place where faith is still vital to real-life experience.

That's a Good One, Emily Dickinson

Editor-in-Chief Brad Fruhauff just figured out that Emily Dickinson was a funny lady. Sometimes.

The Dover edition of Emily Dickinson's Selected Poems contains only 109 of her 1,700 known "poems."1 The other night, I sat down to select those I thought my students should study for the first week of our American Lit class this August. Mind, 109 poems by Emily Dickinson only amount to 49 pages of poetry, all of which features her idiosyncratic style of deceptively simple diction warped into complex syntax within a simple song-like meter. That means you could read it in about an hour and feel pretty good about yourself.

But if poetry is good for anything these days, it teaches us to slow down. The condensation and ordering of language in poetry requires more thought and attention than reading a blog or watching most a film. My need to cull the collection for the "gems worth studying" was additional incentive to take my time and pay attention.

What I found was a new side of Emily Dickinson. I tend to think of her as the poet of death - "I heard a funeral in my brain," "I heard a fly buzz when I died," for instance. But she also writes on nature, love, and the spiritual life, and, most surprisingly, is occasionally even funny.

Granted, it's often a Coen brothers kind of dark humor. Take this poem, for instance, in which a meditation on how death takes us beyond our decadent desires turns suddenly into a biting satire on our vanity:

The dying need but little, dear, -- A glass of water's all, A flower's unobtrusive face To punctuate the wall,

A fan, perhaps, a friend's regret, And certainly that one No color in the rainbow Perceives when you are gone.

Or, in another poem, the speaker imagines being carried through town in her coffin, thinking on all the things and people she'll miss:

'Twas just this time last year I died. I know I heard the corn, When I was carried by the farms,-- It had the tassels on. ............................................ I wondered which would miss me least, And when Thanksgiving came, If father'd multiply the plates To make an even sum.

But since that upsets her, she switches tactics and imagines those she's leaving from another perspective:

But this sort grieved myself, and so I thought how it would be When just this time, some perfect year, Themselves should come to me.

In yet another she apostrophizes the letter she is writing to a lover, asking it to tell him everything that went into the composition of the letter - or, almost everything:

"Tell him the night finished before we finished, And the old clock kept neighing 'day!' And you got sleepy and begged to be ended-- What could it hinder so, to say? Tell him just how she sealed you, cautious, But if he ask where you are hid Until to-morrow,--happy letter! Gesture, coquette, and shake your head!"

For you good Christians out there, she's implying the letter will be kept "next to her heart" (i.e., her breasts, if you're still lost).

I was quite pleased to discover Dickinson's playful side; it gave me license to imagine even the darker poems being written with a certain twinkle in her eye. This is the joy of really studying something--each new approach can reveal something new even in a poem you've read a dozen times.

Incidentally, I think I'll assign the whole book to my students, in two chunks. I want them to look for the patterns and develop a more sophisticated picture of Dickinson than focusing on a few popular poems can accomplish. Plus, it will be a good introduction to the challenge of reading well while reading widely, a skill so hard to practice in our hypertext world.

I'll end with one more poem that I haven't decided whether it's playful in this way or not. If it's not, then it tends toward didacticism. If it is, then it's in that human comedy way.

So proud she was to die It made us all ashamed That what we cherished, so unknown To her desire seemed.

So satisfied to go Where none of us should be, Immediately, that anguish stooped Almost to jealousy.

Brad Fruhauff is Interim Editor-in-Chief of Relief. He has published fiction in The Ankeny Briefcase, poetry in Relief, Salt, and catapult, and reviews in Burnside Writers’ Collective and The Englewood Review of Books. He teaches English at Trinity International University.

1. Many of her poems were actually lines from letters that editors extracted, lineated, and published as we now know them. Incidentally, the Dover edition is a great sampler, but if you're more ambitious, the authoritative complete works is the one edited by Thomas H. Johnson.

Gathering the Kindling

Guest Poetry Editor David Holper shares his experience reading and writing poetry and offers some insight into what he wants for our Fall 2011 issue.

As the guest poetry editor for the upcoming issue of Relief, I want to introduce writers and readers to my tastes and influences as a poet and as a reader of poetry.  Let me start where I typically start with people who ask me who my favorite poet is.  When W.H. Auden was asked this same question in an interview in 1971, he wisely responded, “it suggest[s] that poetry were a horse race where you could put people 1, 2, 3, 4. You can't. If anyone is any good, he is unique and not replaceable by anybody else.”  That’s a good starting place because in reading a lot (and writing a lot), you move beyond gimmicks and you learn to write yourself out of the ruts that often occur in creative work.

As for me, I grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area (in a family of devout atheists, a dis-ease from which I eventually recovered as an adult) and was heavily influenced by the Beats (Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Allen Ginzberg, Gary Snyder), but I was lucky enough to have good writing teachers in high school, college, and graduate school, so all along I was exposed early on to an eclectic variety of styles, voices, and forms.

I began to write my own poetry in high school, but I would say that as important as practicing writing, I regularly attended open mics and poetry readings, put together my own poetry shows (with my other weird poet friends), and often read my work aloud.  That sense of the sound of a poem has been critical to my understanding and writing of poetry.  In college, I also wound up editing the campus literary magazine Toyon, which helped me recognize that quality poetry doesn’t come in just one form, particularly the one with my name on it.  Those habits of reading widely and reading aloud have definitely influenced my craft and my appreciation of other poets.

As an editor, I want a poem to offer me something that I wouldn’t otherwise notice.  I recall hearing a wonderful poem on the radio one day (a poem I’ve never been able to locate afterwards) in which a man describes flying on a plane with his wife who falls asleep next to him.  In staring at her, as well as the sunny space between them, he realizes that in the many years that they have been married, it’s as if a third presence has formed that binds them.  It’s altogether a lovely poem, but lovelier still because it reveals to us something we may have all intuited about couples who have been together for a lifetime and still find themselves in love—that together they seem to form something greater than themselves, and anyone who has basked in such a presence surely feels its blessing.

Then, too, a good poem often has a core: sometimes that core comes in the form of an idea.  Think of so many Wallace Stevens poems or William Carlos Williams’s red wheelbarrow.  Yes, it’s a vivid image that he offers us, but it’s the line that “so much relies upon” that wheelbarrow that tells us what he’s driving at on a deeper level, i.e., the need to notice, to observe image carefully—and yet more carefully still.  But that core may also reside in the form of revelatory emotion, or as Billy Collins said in 2001, “Poetry is the history of the human heart, and it continues to record the history of human emotion, whether it's celebration or grief or whatever it may be.”

Perhaps last of all, poetry for me has become a way to celebrate my faith.  In some way, it should make me sit up and pay attention to life and its sacred dance.  So many people around us go through life on auto pilot, and for me and for many others, poetry is a way to re-awaken us to the holiness that resides within us and all around us.  Whether it’s through picking up the thread of a Biblical narrative, observing life around us, delving into the natural world, or just contemplating Christ’s work in our own lives, a poem should gather the kindling and the wood to reignite that sacred connection that our culture so casually dampens through its superficial, banal concerns.  And when one finds a poem that sets that blaze alight, that poem becomes a treasure not easily set aside.

David Holper has worked as a taxi driver, fisherman, dishwasher, bus driver, soldier, house painter, bike mechanic, bike courier, and teacher. His poems appear in various literary journals and his book of poems, 64 Questions, is available from March Street Press. He teaches at College of the Redwoods and lives in Eureka, CA, far enough from the madness of civilization to get some writing done. He is Relief's guest poetry editor for Issue 5.2.